In the decades since he returned from fighting in World War II,
Stephen Palmer has watched the sprawling Sepulveda VA become a
"birdcage" for care of veterans.

Now he fears the North Hills facility will be further eroded by
plans to build sober-living apartments for homeless vets - and for
others who never served in the military.

"It has to remain for veterans only," declared Palmer,
86, of Panorama City, a former Navy Air Corps instructor who now uses a
VA-supplied wheelchair.

"Don't be deceived: Anything to do with the public, we
will lose. We've been losing since we got back, and it's time it stopped."

Palmer was among dozens of veterans and community activists who
spoke out Friday about a proposed variance in city zoning that would
permit a $40 million sober-living center to be built at the Sepulveda
VA.

They came topped with American Legion hats and sporting
constellations of service medals. And while some bore signs saying,
"Veterans' Land for Veterans' Use Only," others
spoke of lives salvaged by sober-living programs.

Some 200 people packed the five-hour hearing at the Van Nuys Civic
Center in a public hearing before city Associate Zoning Administrator
Linn Wyatt.

Wyatt, who is accepting written testimony about the project through
Friday, will issue a decision sometime this year.

At issue is a 75-year lease signed in 2007 for an affordable
apartment complex for chemically dependent and disabled homeless
veterans at the VA Sepulveda Ambulatory Care Center.

Two former medical buildings would be converted to a 147-unit
complex that would be operated by the nonprofit A Community of Friends.
Its sober-living and job-placement programs would be run by the Los
Angeles nonprofit New Directions.

Clients would be culled from the estimated 20,000 homeless veterans
in the L.A. County area who have no place to go after at least six
months of drug-and-alcohol treatment.

Giving vets 'preference'

But in order to satisfy state and federal fair-housing laws, the
sober-living facility could not limit services to veterans, but instead
would give veterans "preference."

"We will certainly give preference for veterans and target our
marketing for veterans," said Dora Leong Gallo, chief executive
officer of A Community of Friends. "Veterans will always trump
nonveterans off the waiting list."

But to create studio apartments exclusively for veterans would
require special legislation that could take years to pass, she said.

And there lies the rub that has caused an outcry from veterans,
veterans groups and neighborhood councils throughout the region.

They say Lester and Mary Gentry donated 160 acres - which enabled
the Sepulveda VA to open in 1955 - with intent that the land be used for
veterans. And they say a provision in the lease that lets land be sold
to the lessee could open Sepulveda VA to commercial development and
diminish other Veterans Affairs facilities across the nation.

"If this variance is approved, the veterans will not only have
lost the hospital, they will have lost their land," said Loyd Ray,
who co-chairs the Land Use Committee of the North Hills West
Neighborhood Council.

"Once the first variance is granted, it will be easier to
obtain the next, and the next, until the entire 160 acres may be
converted to commercial buildings here in the midst of a single-family
neighborhood."

"That is our land; that is our sacred land," added Edward
Collins, a Navy veteran. "It's for no one else."

A Feb. 17 letter from the Department of Veterans Affairs, however,
states that the New Directions/ACOF lease contains no language that
would allow the sale of the Sepulveda VA buildings.

Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, who had initially opposed the
project, said he made sure that the lease spelled out a preference for
homeless vets.

'It's up to the VA'

Sherman also said it demands that the veteran clients be clean and
sober and that the facility satisfy local zoning requirements and
maintain adequate staff ratios and security measures.

"I will hold them to the fire as long as I've got
fire," said Sherman, who did not attend the hearing.
"It's up to the VA to enforce this lease."

Janine Angeles, a senior lead officer in the Los Angeles Police
Department's Devonshire Division, said 218 crimes, from burglary to
aggravated assault, were reported near the Sepulveda VA in the last six
months.

"Our concern is we don't know who these people are,"
she said of the sober-living clients. "We're concerned
property crimes may go up."

New Directions, which runs five sober-treatment facilities,
countered that they've never had an incident in 15 years.